EXCLUSIVE - ANOTHER BLUE DAY FOR BLUE BADGE HOLDERS

14-08-2006

Sandwell and West Birmingham Health Trust is under fire today for introducing parking charges for disabled visitors.

From midnight, blue badge holders were forced to pay in the main car parks at City Hospital in Birmingham, Sandwell General in West Bromwich and Rowley Regis Community Hospital.

One disgusted user, Barbara Gutteridge from Wednesbury told The Stirrer: “It's a way of getting money out of the most vulnerable people in society.”

The new charges have also been poorly advertised - even this morning, there was no mention of them on the Trust's website.

Barbara, who is registered blind and her husband who has a heart condition, both visited Sandwell Hospital last week to see their son who was an in-patient.

They have a blue badge, but as they were waved through by a security guard he shouted: “That won't be much use to you soon.”

Barbara said: “We wondered what he was talking about, but when we went to pay on Friday we noticed a sign warning that new charges were coming in.

"It also said that blue badge holders would have to pay for the first time.

"It costs £2.50 for two hours, but we were there for five hours the other day.

"It makes you wonder why we've got the blue badge.

"With our health it's not as though we could save the money by parking outside the hospital and walking.

"It's very upsetting."

When The Stirrer checked out the story, we were disappointed to see that the Trust's website doesn't have any reference to the new parking policy - which also means higher prices for other motorists.

It was still falsely claiming today that: “Disabled badge holders may park free of charge if the badge is clearly displayed.”

Spokeswoman Clare Austin told us that until now, parking has been run at a loss on the Trust's sites, diverting money away from patient care.

She added that parking charges were nowbeing brought into line with those at other hospitals in the area, but pointed out that there are non-barrier car parks at both Sandwell and City where parking is still free for blue badge holders.

Reduced price season tickets are also available for frequent visitors, and there is provision for disabled drivers on low incomes to claim back parking charges from the government.

The Stirrer wonders how much that bureaucratic scheme costs to administer - and also why it's so poorly advertised - again, there's no mention of it on the Trust's website.

Now it'sarguable that in the general run of things, patient care should not be compromised by hiring security staff to look aftervisitors cars.

Fair enough to make the rest of us pay you might think.

But surely an exception should be made for those who can't easily get around.

It seems that after “Heartless” Heartlands Hospital introduced similar charges for blue badge holders recently , every NHS Trust in the West Midlands is preparing to follow suit.

Once again it seems that our health service is putting profits before people.